Last Night in Baseball: Yankees Win Wild Back-And-Forth With The Rays in Extras

There is always baseball happening — almost too much baseball for one person to follow themselves.

Don’t worry, we’re here to help you by figuring out what you missed but shouldn’t have. Here are all the best moments from last night in Major League Baseball:

Yankees walk it off in extras in wild win

So this is fun. 

Let’s explain what all went down there. In the third inning, Brandon Lowe hit an RBI double, giving the Rays a 1-0 lead. From that point forward, both teams held it down on the mound, with Zack Littell (in what ended up being his last start with the Rays, as he was traded to the Reds on Wednesday) and Will Warren posting zeroes the rest of the way. The bullpens kept it up on both sides, too, until the eighth when Trent Grisham finally got the Yankees a run with a solo homer.

Giancarlo Stanton would give the Yankees a lead later in the inning with an RBI single that drove in Oswald Peraza, but there would be no second scoring drought. The Rays answered in the top of the ninth with a two-run homer by Josh Lowe, giving them the lead once more.

That lead wouldn’t last. With the Yankees down to their final two outs, Anthony Volpe came to the plate, and he hit a solo shot to tie things up again.

The game would go to extras, where Jonathan Aranda would put the Rays up, 4-3, with a sacrifice fly that scored Taylor Walls. Tampa Bay couldn’t get anything else going in the inning, though, despite having Brandon Lowe and Yandy Diaz in scoring position after the sac fly, and New York would take advantage.

An RBI triple by Cody Bellinger tied the game once more…

…and then Ryan McMahon, who was traded by the Rockies to the Yankees at the start of the week, came through with the walk-off hit. While it just goes into the box score as a single, McMahon got behind this one, and drove it over center fielder Jonny DeLuca all the way to the warning track.

A pitching duel with the Rays in control for so long, until it suddenly became a back-and-forth affair full of homers and big hits. The Yankees came out on top, and good timing, too, because the first-place Blue Jays finally stopped their skid and defeated the Orioles, keeping New York four games back in the AL East.

What a throw!

Sometimes it is genuinely stunning just how strong the arms of Major League Baseball players can be. Like with this play from Marlins’ third baseman Graham Pauley:

Yohel Pozo thought he was safe, but how could he not? That ball was hit deep into third base territory down the line, and dragged Pauley well foul — when he finally made the throw, he was in line with the ump! Despite having everything going against him, Pauley managed to make a strong, accurate throw to third that nailed Pozo. Incredible play.

Speaking of incredible plays

Mike Yastrzemski went all out catching this foul ball. Leaning over the fence wasn’t going to be enough, not with how low the fence is. So Yaz just decided to hop it instead, only not head on. He did a sideways jump and landed in the netting behind the wall.

Yastrzemski made the catch, though, and he held that glove up so everyone would know it for sure. He needed a hand getting back out of the netting, but hey, he also deserved a hand for that play.

Paddack makes his Tigers debut

The Tigers acquired Chris Paddack from the Twins on Monday to replace the injured Reese Olson in their rotation, and the hope was that he’d be able to pitch better than his surface numbers, and instead more like his FIP, which has been around a run better than his ERA for years now. 

So far, so good: Paddack went six innings with five strikeouts against zero walks, and allowed three hits and one run. While Diamondbacks’ starter Ryne Nelson was just as good — he had eight strikeouts and no walks in 5.1 innings while allowing one earned run — the D-backs’ defense betrayed him. Shortstop Geraldo Perdomo made an error in the fourth that allowed a run to score, and then later in the same frame — when Arizona already had two outs — Kerry Carpenter hit a two-run homer to put Detroit up 4-1. They would never surrender that lead, and have now won four in a row.

Andujar hits two. Wait, really?

The Athletics defeated the Mariners 5-4 on Wednesday, and can thank Miguel Andujar for that. With the bases empty in the fourth, Andujar hit his fifth home run of the year to put the A’s up 3-1. 

He wasn’t done, though, despite the fact he’s not much of a power hitter at all. On Wednesday, he was! With the A’s holding on 4-3 in the seventh, Andujar went deep a second time — the first multi-homer game of this career.

That dinger would be the difference, with the Mariners managing to score another run in the ninth. But hey, at least they picked up a W later on in the evening, when they worked out a deal to add Eugenio Suárez before Thursday’s trade deadline.

Padres sweep the Mets

The Mets spent most of Wednesday trying to fix their bullpen, and their series against the Padres was a pretty good indication of why. New York’s relievers allowed six runs on Tuesday in a 7-1 loss, and while they gave up just two on Monday, they still blew the game in the ninth and lost. Wednesday’s game, at least, was the fault of their starting pitching, but still. You can’t be too careful.

Yu Darvish got the start for San Diego, and was excellent: seven innings with no walks nor runs allowed, with just two hits against seven strikeouts. His win was the 204th of his career, which might sound like a random number to cite, but it’s actually a milestone: with that W, Darvish broke the tie between himself and Hiroki Kuroda for the most combined career wins between Japan’s Nippon Professional Baseball and MLB.

While Darvish had things under control — especially with San Diego giving him five runs of support — a play like this from Jake Cronenworth is certainly appreciated, anyway.

Oh that’s why the Phillies added a reliever

The White Sox and Phillies were tied 2-2 through six innings, and then Chicago exploded for seven runs in the bottom of the seventh. Philadelphia used two relievers whose ERAs for the year are over five in the game, and one of them wasn’t even Jordan Romano, whose ERA is closer to seven. So yes you could say that adding Jhoan Duran should help them down the stretch.

As for the White Sox, they finished the month 12-13 after going 8-4 following the All-Star break. That might not sound like much, but remember that (1) the White Sox set the modern losses record just a year ago and (2) they were at one point on pace to be even worse than that in 2025. If they keep it up they might even escape losing 100 games.

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